1987

Contents

Significant events

January

5 and 26 - The series of "Piper's Pit" segments, leading up to and culminating in André the Giant's heel turn, alliance with Bobby Heenan and demand for a match against Hulk Hogan for the WWF World Heavyweight Championship in anticipation of WrestleMania III, are taped. The programs would air the weekends of January 17, 24 and 31; and February 7 and 14, and ended with Hogan accepting André's challenge

26: During a WWF Superstars of Wrestling taping in Tampa, Florida, the storyline involving WWF referee Danny Davis reaches a tipping point when he is, in kayfabe, "suspended for life" by WWF president Jack Tunney. This is to facilitate Davis' transition from a referee to a wrestler (Davis had wrestled in the past as masked wrestler Mr. X, mainly as a jobber), and continues an ongoing storyline involving his bias toward heel wrestlers. The "final straw" comes earlier in the TV taping, where he officiates the match where the The Hart Foundation wins the WWF Tag Team title from the British Bulldogs. (The title change comes to allow the Dynamite Kid to heal from serious (legitimate) injuries before WrestleMania III; prior to the match, Davey Boy Smith was booked with various tag team partners in WWF Tag Team Championship title matches)

Roddy Piper announces he is retiring from wrestling following WrestleMania III, and that his match against Adrian Adonis would be his last. The "retirement" turns out to be a two-year hiatus from wrestling, in which he heals from injuries and films several movies

28 - Jim Neidhart is indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of assaulting and interfering with a flight attendant. Neidhart is later acquitted of the charges

March

Several takes of what was intended to be a new interview segment for the WWF's syndicated television programs, "Missy's Manor" (with Missy Hyatt, to replace "Piper's Pit"), are taped during television tapings at at least three arena shows. These segments never are aired on television, however; reportedly, Hyatt's poor mic and interview skills, poor interaction with her guests (both faces and heels) and overall subpar performance and negative fan reaction were given as reasons, and Hyatt soon departs the WWF. Jake Roberts' "Snake Pit" segment will instead replace "Piper's Pit" until mid-summer, with several of his segments reusing re-written "Missy's Manor" scripts. Afterward, an in-arena podium interview segment (with either Gene Okerlund or Craig DeGeorge) will air on a weekly basis -- usually, after the fourth match of the show -- for the next 15 months

1 - Bruno Sammartino is inducted into the Italian-American Sports Hall of Fame in his hometown of Pittsburgh

29 - WrestleMania III draws an announced record crowd of 93,173 fans to the Pontiac Silverdome in Pontiac, Michigan. The main event saw Hulk Hogan defeat André the Giant (handing him his first pinfall loss in a WWF ring in 15 years), but one of the undercard matches - Rick Steamboat defeating Randy Savage to win the WWF Intercontinental Championship - steals the show, receives universal critical acclaim and goes on to be cited as one of the greatest matches in professional wrestling history

April

The Global Wrestling Alliance becomes the first wrestling promotion to be publicly traded

26 - Hacksaw Duggan and the Iron Sheik are arrested by New Jersey state police, with Duggan charged with marijuana possession and drinking while driving, while Sheik was charged with marijuana and cocaine possession. Duggan is given a conditional discharge, while Sheik gets one year probation and is released from his WWF contract

4 - The inaugural WarGames match is held by Jim Crockett Promotions in Atlanta, Georgia during the Great American Bash tour. The Road Warriors (Animal and Hawk), Dusty Rhodes, Nikita Koloff and Paul Ellering defeat the Four Horsemen (Ric Flair, Tully Blanchard, Lex Luger, Arn Anderson and J.J. Dillon) in the main event twin steel cage match when Dillon submitted after he landed awkwardly on his right arm when he was hit by the Warriors' Doomsday Device finisher

15 - During a television taping at the Glens Falls (New York) Civic Center, to help get One Man Gang's monster heel character over, OMG repeatedly delivers his front suplex on his opponent, jobber David Stoudemeier, before doing the same to at least two other jobbers and a referee. Later during the summer, OMG famously attacks midget wrestler Little Beaver during a match against Hillbilly Jim at the Boston Garden, again to get his character over

18 - Dusty Rhodes defeats Tully Blanchard to win $100,000 in a barbed wireladder match at a Great American Bash tour stop in Charlotte, North Carolina

August

29 - Bruno Sammartino wrestles his last match for the WWF, teaming with Hulk Hogan in a victory over King Kong Bundy and One Man Gang, at a non-televised event in Baltimore, Maryland; his final televised match was taped a day earlier and saw "The Living Legend" defeat Hercules (despite André the Giant being in Hercules' corner). Sammartino would continue as color commentator for the WWF for the roughly the next six months, although his on-camera appearances and comments would gradually diminish until leaving the company -- and not on good terms, as his discontent with the WWF's product of the time was starting to become known -- by the end of February 1988.

September

17 - Piledriver - The Wrestling Album 2, the second album of vocal performances of WWF wrestlers and wrestling entrance themes, is released on Epic Records. Eight videos are recorded and aired on the WWF's syndicated and cable programs, and three of the videos - the title track, performed by Koko B. Ware; "Jive Soul Bro," performed by Slick; and "Girls In Cars" (by Robbie Dupree) - will air on MTV.

23 - The on-screen friendship of Randy Savage and Hulk Hogan forms following Savage's match against The Honky Tonk Man for the WWF Intercontinental Championship (aired October 3 on Saturday Night's Main Event). The friendship formed after Hogan had, at Miss Elizabeth's request, run in to stop a 3-on-1 beatdown of Savage by Honky and The Hart Foundation (Bret Hart and Jim Neidhart), in which Elizabeth was shoved to the canvas by Honky after she tried to stop the attack

October

Professional wrestling journalist Wade Keller begins publication of Pro Wrestling Torch, which like the Wrestling Observer Newsletter includes weekly columns, news reporting and analysis, and shoot interviews of professional wrestling personalities.

27 - Superstar Billy Graham wrestles his last television match during a taping at the War Memorial in Syracuse, New York, defeating Butch Reed by disqualification. Due to Graham's deteriorating real-life physical condition (he had recently had hip surgery) no longer allowing him to be an active wrestler, an ending is devised to have One Man Gang run into the match and aid Reed in a two-on-one attack by "injuring" Graham to the point where he was permanently injured. Although Graham and Reed would wrestle at several untelevised house shows into November (the match aired the weekend of November 14 on WWF Superstars of Wrestling), this match is cited as having ended Graham's in-ring wrestling career

November

18 - During a television taping at the Omaha (Nebraska) Civic Center, the genesis of the Hulk Hogan-Ted DiBiase feud takes place with a podium interview, in which DiBiase (who had returned four months earlier to the WWF, after a 7-1/2 year absence) announces his intent to buy the WWF Heavyweight Championship from Hogan. The segment is aired December 13 on WWF Superstars of Wrestling; on the following week's Superstars, taped December 8 at the Sun Dome in Tampa, Florida, Hogan emphatically says "HELL NO!" to DiBiase's offer

19 - Akira Maeda breaks Riki Chōshū's orbital bone when he delivers a shoot kick to Chōshū's face as the latter has Osamu Kido tied up in the Sharpshooter during a New Japan tag team match. Maeda was subsequently fired from New Japan for the incident

26 - Jim Crockett Promotions' presents its inaugural pay-per-view event, Starrcade 1987, at the UIC Pavillion in Chicago, Illinois. The pay-per-view debut of JCP's flagship annual Starrcade event is sabotaged, however, when Vince McMahon creates a new WWF PPV event, the Survivor Series, at the eleventh hour and deliberately schedules its inaugural edition against Starrcade. McMahon then coerces cable companies into dropping Starrcade in favor of the Survivor Series by refusing to allow them to air future WWF PPV events if they aired Starrcade instead of his event; as a result, only a few cable companies chose to air Starrcade as most choose to air the Survivor Series instead

December

8 - Shortly before a WWF Superstars of Wrestling taping in Tampa, Florida, Greg Valentine threatens to resign after he and Dino Bravo were asked to participate in a storyline where they would begin feuding with the British Bulldogs, with heat built for the The New Dream Team after Valentine and Bravo "kidnap" Matilda the Wonder Dog (the Bulldogs' mascot) from ringside during a match. Valentine -- already unhappy with teaming with Bravo, with whom he legitimately did not get along and also felt he had poor chemistry with -- objected to the storyline and walked out of the taping. The Islanders are given the heel role in the storyline, and the storyline plays out as intended (the Islanders taking Matilda to an "unknown location" (in the storyline only; in actuality it was a pre-designated room in the arena). Valentine is back by the next day, participating in television tapings for WWF Wrestling Challenge in Fort Meyers, Florida, with Jimmy Hart as his manager. The New Dream Team is quietly dissolved; Johnny Valiant has departed the WWF (last appearing at theSurvivor Series), and Bravo is now paired with Frenchy Martin

27 - Big Van Vader defeats Antonio Inoki in 2:27 in Vader's Japanese debut at Ryōgoku Kokugikan (Sumo Hall) in Tokyo. A riot ensues following the match, leading to New Japan being banned from Sumo Hall for over a year in the aftermath